The absurdity of teachers carrying guns

Michele Eve Sandberg / Getty-AFP

A woman sets up her "concealed carry purses" booth and shows how the gun fits in the bag on Feb. 16, 2018, during preparations for the South Florida Gun Show at the Dade County Youth Fairgrounds in Miami.

A woman sets up her "concealed carry purses" booth and shows how the gun fits in the bag on Feb. 16, 2018, during preparations for the South Florida Gun Show at the Dade County Youth Fairgrounds in Miami. (Michele Eve Sandberg / Getty-AFP)

How long after teachers start coming to school armed for battle until a principal somewhere in America makes this embarrassing announcement over the PA system? Attention, a Glock 9 mm pistol with a 22-round magazine was left in the teacher’s lounge — again. Will the owner please come to the office to retrieve it?

We jest, because the idea of allowing teachers and administrators to carry firearms in school is so absurd and irresponsible, it needs to be laughed off — quickly. Then the country can get back to reality-based discussions about how to better protect kids, and everyone else, by deterring mass shooters.

As we’ve written, there are steps to make it harder for a villain to obtain weapons, including background checks on every gun purchase. Schools can do more to protect themselves, too, by tightening security and holding more active shooter drills. But no, let’s not get distracted by the fantasy that teachers should pack heat. President Donald Trump was in full fever on Friday suggesting that having a certain number of armed teachers on staff would have stopped the Feb. 14 massacre at a Florida high school. “A teacher would have shot the hell out of him before he even knew what happened,” Trump imagined.

That’s unlikely. There are tens of thousands of schools across the country. What are the chances of an armed, trained, literally-cool-under-fire social studies teacher taking down a gunman? The odds are much higher of an accidental discharge during study period, or a disturbed student disarming the teacher. Worse, we picture an angry teacher on a bad day pulling a gun on a student with an attitude. And if there were a shooter in the hallways? Given the chaos, terror and suddenness of an attack, chances are an armed teacher strikes a bystander, or gets shot mistakenly by law enforcement rather than disarming or disabling the bad guy.

Even contemplating this scenario presupposes that faculty members would enlist. We expect many would reject the idea of being armed. They wouldn’t want the responsibility and see the folly. These are teachers, after all, who recognize the dystopian lesson: Kids, you live in a dangerous world you can never hope to improve through peaceful means. So let’s lock and load.

Teachers and administrators do important work, as do police and other first responders. Let teachers educate children, and leave the protection of civilians to other professionals.